1．Asia News.it (http://www.asianews.it)
Science confirms tomb contains mortal remains of Apostle Paul, says Pope, 29 June 2009
Benedict XVI brings the Pauline year to a close, reporting the results of a probe into the sarcophagus inside the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls. Through the newness of the Christian faith one grows up without adhering to the world’s fashions and mindsets, defending life and marriage between a man and a woman. Faith generates progress in truth and love. The mystery of Christ has value for the cosmos, for every people and the entire universe.
Vatican City (AsiaNews) – With “great emotion” Benedict XVI announced that a recent scientific probe confirmed what Catholic tradition has always held, namely that the body of the Apostle Paul is located under the papal altar in the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls. The announcement was made today in the basilica itself during the homily of the First Vespers of the Feast Day of Saints Peter and Paul, which brings the Pauline Year to a close, a year that was held to celebrate 2,000 years since the birth of the Apostle of Tarsus.
The Pontiff said that recently the tomb was “subject to a scientific investigation. A small hole was drilled in the sarcophagus, unopened for centuries, and a probe was introduced. It found traces of a valuable purple fabric, in linen and gold layer-laminated, and a blue fabric with linen threads. Red incense grains and substances containing proteins and limestone were also discovered. Small fragments of bone were found and radiocarbon dated by experts who did not know their place of origin. Results indicate that they belong to someone who lived between the 1st and 2nd century A.D. This seems to confirm the unanimous and undisputed tradition according to which these are the mortal remains of the Apostle Paul. All this fills our soul with deep emotion.”
In a crowded basilica and in the presence of representatives of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, the sister Orthodox Church, the Pope outlined some of the elements in Apostle Paul’s message which must become part of the everyday existence of Christians.
“The Pauline Year has come to an end, but being on the same path as Paul and, with him and thanks to him, know Jesus and, like him, be enlightened and transformed by the Gospel, will always be part of Christian existence,” the Pontiff said.
Newness was the first element he stressed. Citing Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Ch. 12), he said that “with Christ a new way to worship God, a new form of worship, began. It lies in the fact that the living man becomes himself adoration, “sacrifice” even in his body. No longer are things offered to God but our own existence becomes a way to praise God.”
“We must become new men,” the Holy Father said, “transformed in a new way of existence. The world is always looking for new things because it is rightly unhappy of reality as it is. Paul told us that without new men the world cannot be renewed. Only if there are new men will there be a new world, a renewed and better world.”
For the Pontiff what is new is in Paul himself who “became new, someone else, because he no longer lived for himself and in himself but for Christ and in Him. Over the years he saw that this process of renewal and transformation went on during one’s whole life. As we become new we allow ourselves to be seized and moulded by the New Man Jesus Christ.”
“The way of thinking of old men, the standard way of thinking is usually directed at possessing, well-being, influence, success, fame and so on. But in being so it has a limited reach. In the end one’s own self remains the centre of the world . . . . We must learn [instead] to share Jesus Christ’s thinking and will. Once that is done we shall be new men in which a new world emerges.”
This newness also means having a grown-up rather than a childish faith; it is an invitation not to conform or adhere to the standard mindset.
“In the last few decades the expression ‘grown-up faith’ has spread,” Benedict XVI said. “It is often used in relation to the attitudes of those who no longer pay attention to what the Church and its Pastors say—which is to say, those who choose on their own what to believe or not believe in a sort of ‘do-it-yourself’ faith. Expressing oneself against the Magisterium of the Church is presented as a sort of ‘courage’, whereas in fact not much courage is needed because one can be certain that it will get public applause. Instead courage is needed to adhere to the Church’s faith, even if it contradicts the mould of today’s world. Paul calls this non-conformism a ‘grown-up faith’. For him following the prevailing winds and currents of the time is childish. For this reason dedicating oneself to the inviolability of life from its beginning, radically opposing the principle of violence, in the defence precisely of the most defenceless; recognising the lifetime marriage between a man and a woman in accordance with the Creator’s order, re-established again by Christ is also part of a grown-up faith. A grown-up faith does not follow any current here and there. It is against the winds of fashion.”
A grown-up faith is the one that grows by living the truth in love (cf Ephesians, 4:15). Both are necessary because God is both. “The Apostle told us that by living the truth in love, we can make the whole—the universe—grow by aiming for Christ. . . . The ultimate purpose of Christ’s work is the universe—the transformation of the universe, of mankind’s entire world, of the whole of creation. Those who with Christ live the truth in love contribute to the world’s progress. Yes! Here it is clear that Paul is aware of the idea of progress. Through his life, suffering and resurrection, Christ was the real great leap of progress for humanity and the world. Now the universe must grow in view of Him. Where the presence of Christ grows, there is real progress in the world.”
In order for this renewal to occur it is necessary to strengthen the inner self (Ephesians, 3:16). “Men are often empty inside and thus must grasp for promises and drugs, which end up adding to their inner sense of emptiness,” the Pope explained. “This inner emptiness, man’s inner weakness, is one of today’s great problems. The inner self—the heart’s perceptiveness, the capacity to see and understand the world and man from within, with the heart—must be strengthened. We need reason enlightened by the heart to learn to act in accordance to the truth in love. This cannot be done without an intimate relationship with God, without a life of prayer. We need to meet God, something which is given to us in the Sacraments. And we cannot speak to God in prayer if we do not let Him speak first, if we do not listen to him in the word he gave us.”
In his final thoughts the Pope turned to the cosmic dimensions of the mystery of Christ, about its “breadth and length and height and depth” (Ephesians, 3:18). “The mystery of Christ has a cosmic vastness. He does not belong only to a given group. The crucified Christ embraces the whole universe in all its dimensions. He takes the world in his hands and raises it towards God . . . . In the Cross Christ’s love has embraced the lowest depth—the darkness of death—and the supreme height—God’s own nobility. He has taken in his arms the breadth and the vastness of humanity and the world in all their distances. He always embraces the universe—for all of us.”
2．WorldWide Religious News（http://wwrn.org）
(1)"Significant Findings Uncovered At The Tomb Of St. Paul"
("RedOrbit", June 29, 2009)
Rome, Italy - Tiny bone fragments dated from the first or second century have been identified in a tomb in the Basilica of St. Paul in Rome. Pope Benedict made the announcement on Sunday, and also claimed the findings confirmed suspicions that it held the apostle’s remains, Reuters accounted.
"This seems to confirm the unanimous and undisputed tradition that these are the mortal remains on the Apostle Paul," the pontiff said at St Paul's Outside the Walls, on the eve of the Feasts of St Peter and St Paul celebrated on Monday.
About AD 65, Paul met his martyrdom in Rome after widely sharing the Gospel to pagan Greeks and Romans. Along with Peter, Paul is one of the most revered among Christians as one of the greatest early missionaries and founders of the Christian church.
According to Christian tradition, St. Paul was laid to rest with St. Peter in a catacomb on the Via Appia, before being transferred to the basilica built in his honor. It has been commonly believed for centuries that his remains were buried under the altar.
In 2006, Vatican archaeologists were finally able to apply scientific research to the religious tradition when a stone sarcophagus was discovered at the location.
During the "Pauline Year," a year when the Roman Catholic church celebrated the second millennium of the birth of the "Apostle of the Gentiles," the first findings were discovered.
Pope Benedict recounted the specifics of the discovery, saying a small hole had been drilled in the sarcophagus to allow for examination of the inside, exposing "traces of a precious linen cloth, purple in color, laminated with pure gold, and a blue colored textile with filaments of linen."
"It also revealed the presence of grains of red incense and traces of protein and limestone. There were also tiny fragments of bone, which, when subjected to Carbon 14 tests by experts, turned out to belong to someone who lived in the first or second century," said the Pope.
News of the bone fragments were accompanied by news that Vatican archaeologists had also found what they suppose is the oldest existing image of St. Paul on the walls of the catacomb beneath Rome, dating from the late 4th century.
The finding was published in the Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano on Sunday, a red background picture of a frescoed image of the face of a man with a high furrowed forehead and sharp black beard, consumed in a bright yellow halo.
The discovery was made on June 19 by experts of the Ponitifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology inside the Catacomb of Santa Tecla in Rome. The Vatican newspaper described it as "the oldest icon in history dedicated to the cult of the Apostle."
It was customary practice of the time for early Christians to bury their dead under the city in catacombs dug into the rock, and then decorate the underground walls with devotional images, similar to Pompeian fashion.
・Disclaimer: WWRN does not endorse or adhere to views or opinions expressed in the articles posted. This is purely an information site, to inform interested parties of religious trends.
(2)"Oldest known portrait of St Paul revealed by Vatican archaeologists"
By Richard Owen ("The Times", June 29, 2009)
Rome, Italy - Vatican archaeologists have uncovered what they say is the oldest known portrait of St Paul. The portrait, which was found two weeks ago but has been made public only after restoration, shows St Paul with a high domed forehead, deep-set eyes and a long pointed beard, confirming the image familiar from later depictions.
L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, which devoted two pages to the discovery, said that the oval portrait, dated to the 4th century, had been found in the catacombs of St Thecla, not far from the Basilica of St Paul’s Outside the Walls, where the apostle is buried. The find was “an extraordinary event”, said Monsignor Gianfranco Ravasi, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture.
Barbara Mazzei, a restorer, said that centuries of grime had been removed with a laser. Fabrizio Bisconti, Professor of Christian Iconography at Rome University and a member of the team that made the discovery, said that it appeared to have decorated the tomb of a nobleman or high church official.
Professor Bisconti said that the catacombs contained hundreds of Christians who had wanted to be buried near St Thecla, a Roman Christian martyr — not to be confused with the friend of St Paul known from the apocryphal “Acts of Paul and Thecla” or the English 8th-century Benedictine nun of the same name. Pope Benedict XVI, who a year ago announced a “Pauline Year” dedicated to the apostle that ended yesterday, said that it had been “a true period of grace in which, through pilgrimages, catecheses, publications and various initiatives, the figure of St Paul was offered again to the entire Church. His vibrant message among Christian communities has revived everywhere the passion for Christ and the Gospel.”
It is widely believed that the spread of Christianity would not have been possible without St Paul. A Roman Jew from what is now Turkey, he founded churches throughout the Roman Empire. He was executed — it is believed beheaded — in AD65 for his beliefs.
・Disclaimer: WWRN does not endorse or adhere to views or opinions expressed in the articles posted. This is purely an information site, to inform interested parties of religious trends.
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